Israel killed a senior Islamic Jihad commander in an airstrike on a refugee camp in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, the second since it began its military offensive against the Palestinian Islamist group three days ago.
The Palestinian movement, which has claimed responsibility for dozens of suicide attacks against Israelis, has fired hundreds of rockets in responseincluding several this Sunday towards Jerusalem, which has raised the risk of large-scale hostilities to the maximum.
The Islamist movement Hamas, which has resisted several Israeli offensives since it took control of Gaza in 2006, including one in May 2021, appears to remain on the sidelines for now.
Israeli operations have historically caused enormous damage in Gaza, and Hamas and Israel now have agreements, including issuing work permits to hundreds of residents of the enclave, that strengthen the Islamist group’s control.
Islamic Jihad commander Khaled Mansur was killed in an airstrike on an apartment in the refugee camp in the city of Rafah, in the southern Mediterranean coastal strip.Israel said.
Islamic Jihad confirmed the death of Mansur hours later, the second of its commanders to die after Taysir al Jabari ‘Abu Mahmud’, one of the main leaders of the group, whom Israel killed last Friday.
Two other Islamic Jihad militants and five civilians were killed in the Rafah attack, bringing the number of Palestinians killed since the start of the offensive to 31.
Among the dead were six children and four women.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said more than 250 people have been injured since Friday, the AFP news agency reported.
The armed wing of Islamic Jihad, the Al Quds Brigades, declared this Sunday that it had launched rockets towards Jerusalem, shortly after sirens resounded near the city.
Earlier it said it had fired another “big barrage” of rockets at the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv, Ashkelon, Ashdod and Sderot.
Most were intercepted by Israel’s missile shield, the army said, and two people were slightly injured by shrapnel, according to emergency services.
The Israeli army said on Saturday that it was preparing “for a one-week operation.” “Currently there are no negotiations with a view to a ceasefire,” said a military spokesman.
Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid said the operation would continue “as long as necessary.”
This new escalation has already deprived the small enclave and its 2.3 million inhabitants of its only power plant, which had to close due to lack of fuel, due to the blockade of the entrances to the enclave by Israel since Tuesday.
The Gaza Strip is one of the two Palestinian territories. The other, the West Bank, is controlled by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s secular Fatah movement and is separated from the strip by Israeli territory.
Israel has occupied and colonized the West Bank and East Jerusalem since 1967. The international community considers it illegal.
The Palestinians aspire to found a state in the West Bank and Gaza with its capital in East Jerusalem, the majority-Palestinian part of the holy city.
